Construction Beauty Queen (19 page)

Matt stopped breathing, his entire body instantly chilled. “What are you talking about?”

“My father’s company is looking to build a brand-new main office and production floor. It’s at least twelve million dollars of construction work. I’ve recommended Kortville Construction to him.”

The scorn on the faces of Mr. and Mrs. Jamison when they’d walked into his office and caught him feeling up their daughter remained vivid images. He didn’t want to be their hired help, so they’d have one more excuse to look down their noses at him. “I don’t do that kind of work.”

“But you can, right? You have the skills. You just need more manpower and equipment. I sent him a preliminary proposal.”

Matt shoved back from the table so abruptly his chair tipped backward as he stood. He ignored it, afraid if he picked it up he would smash it against the wall. “What possessed you to tie me up in a multiyear project without consulting me?”

She smiled and placed her hand on his bare chest. “You want to make this company profitable and successful—it’s your dream. I talked to other contractors before I submitted the plan. I know it’s a huge job that’ll take a lot of time and new employees, but you have enormous profit potential.”

Her hand scalded him. “Fulfilling my dreams is my problem, not yours. I don’t want this job. Kortville Construction is a small-town, small-time operation, just the way my brother wanted it to be.” His hands shook. For the first time, he knew his dreams were at odds with Steve’s.

Her smile faded, and she pulled her hand back. “Why not? This is your chance.”

“To be rich? To move in the same circles as you? Wake up, Veronica. That’s not who I am. You can set me up to rebuild the Chicago skyline, but you’re not going to turn me into that type of man.”

As torn as he was about straying from his brother’s vision, he’d thought Veronica had come to accept him for who he was. She’d certainly given every appearance of it last night. But the indisputable proof that the man he was right now wasn’t good enough for her stabbed the fatal dagger through his heart.

…

Veronica was still struggling to understand exactly what she’d done that was so awful. “I’m trying to improve your bottom line and the long-term success of the company. Changing the type of man you are has nothing to do with it.”

“Doesn’t it? You had your fun slumming with me. Not you can go home and live off that memory while you enjoy the pampered life that I’ll never be able to give you.”

She’d been so sure their lifestyle differences didn’t matter anymore. After all, she’d adjusted to small-town life, and she loved it. “I’m not going anywhere. I plan to help you keep the bills and the payroll and the accounts receivable on the up-and-up through the whole job—and longer if you’ll say yes.”

Say yes.
She willed him to say it.

The job didn’t matter. Not compared to what she really wanted. It should have been obvious when she’d dedicated herself to straightening out his finances and discovering new profit potential. She had to have been completely dense not to have realized it last night as she worked side by side with him in the dingy basement and leaned against him in the dark truck. But she’d been oblivious, even when she’d given him her body.

She’d fallen in love with him. She’d fallen head over heels for Matt Shaw, his pure work ethic, his dedication to the town, and his adorable niece. She’d fallen for not just the man but the entire package.

Matt stared at her, his gaze eerily similar to the way he’d looked at her when she’d first arrived in town and he believed she was a threat to everything he stood for. “You went behind my back and arranged a deal with your father to make me into someone I wasn’t and have no desire to be.”

“No deal has been made unless you want one. I suggested it to give you an opportunity to achieve the things you want out of life.” She’d wanted to hand him his dream on a silver platter. She’d imagined he’d fall over with gratitude, adoration, and love. But no, the only love in the room was on her end. For her naïveté, she deserved his scorn, as well as her own.

“I already have everything I need,” he said with deathly quiet.

He turned and marched out of her trailer…and out of her life.

…

“You were right.” Veronica stood at the front door of Ron’s house. “I should have gone back to my parents as soon as I came into town.”

She wanted to pretend everything was okay, that she was a flighty airhead who’d buckled under the strain of hard work. Her plan had been to smile and laugh as she said it, not have her eyes fill with tears. She’d spent a day and a half alone in her trailer hugging Matt’s T-shirt and trying to get herself under control. She shouldn’t have had any tears left.

Ron’s eyes narrowed. “What happened?”

“You know, I broke a nail.” She held up her hands, still scraped from working the outdoor jobs but healing enough that they didn’t need to be bandaged.

“Come inside,” Ron said gruffly, leaning on his cane as he backed out of the doorway.

She stepped into his house. It was decorated with dark wood paneling, a single brown recliner, a coffee table littered with books and newspapers, a jumbo flat-screen TV, and smelled distinctly of cigars and aftershave.

“What did he do to you?” Ron demanded, closing the door behind her.

“What? M-Matt?” She stumbled on his name. “Nothing.” She rubbed her hands up and down her arms. “I quit, like you wanted me to. I couldn’t take the work anymore.”

“You go back there, and you stick with it,” Ron said.

“No, it’s over. You know I have other plans now. Matt was the only reason for me to stay with Kortville Construction.” And now she didn’t have any reason to be there at all. She bit her lip and blinked rapidly.

“Did you tell him all the work you did to prove the partnership needed to be dissolved and help him get his business back?” Ron asked.

“Actually, I did. He wasn’t happy about that, either.”

“Not happy that you were handing him his dream?” Ron sounded appalled. “What’s wrong with that man? If he doesn’t want my half of the partnership, I’ll give it to you.”

“No, I don’t want it. I really don’t.” She shuddered to think of how much more Matt would hate her if Ron did that, if it was even possible for Matt to hate her more than he already did.

Ron set his cane aside and limped toward her. “What happened between you and Matt? Did he hurt you?”

She shook her head but had to press her fist against the ache in her heart. “He just has a different vision for his life.” One that didn’t include her, not even on the periphery.

“You know, I’m still half owner,” Ron said. “I could take out some big loans, underprice a bunch of jobs, buy a lot of equipment he can’t afford, and basically run the business into the ground…and
then
sign it over to him.”

“No, please.” She reached out and squeezed his hands to make him understand this was much too serious for his games. “Matt’s worked so hard to make his business a success. I know you bailed him out at the beginning, but he does all the work. He deserves to have it belong to him.”

Ron stared into her eyes. “You fell in love with him, and that jerk broke your heart, didn’t he?”

There was nothing else to add. Ron had summed it up exactly. She looked away and tried to pull her hands free. “It doesn’t matter.”

“It matters. Love always matters.” He kept a tight hold on her hands. “Come into the kitchen. I have a pot of coffee on.”

She finally got her hands free and followed him into another room with dark paneling and twenty-year-old appliances. He nudged her into a chair and set a steaming cup in front of her.

“So tell me what happened?” Ron pulled out the chair across from her and sat down.

“Nothing. You know us flighty types. We give our hearts away too quickly. They’re easily broken and just as easily mended.” She attempted a breezy tone, but her throat was so thick with tears that she failed miserably. She cupped her hands around the hot mug and stared into its murky depths.

She’d tried to turn off her love for her parents and pretend she didn’t care as she walked out on them. It hadn’t worked. In less than two weeks, they’d been fully back in her life. She’d have less success living in the same town as Matt, watching him continue his day-to-day life. After making such a show of her so-called willpower, she’d gone and done what she’d promised she wouldn’t do. She’d depended on someone else to fulfill her and make her happy.

Ron tipped her chin up, so she was forced to look at him. “You were right when you stood up to me and pointed out you deserved a lot more respect than I was giving you. I think Matt could use the same slap on the head.”

She lifted her mug to her lips, even though her throat wasn’t capable of swallowing. She hadn’t come here to bash Matt. “I’m going to stay in town and base my consulting business here. My trailer’s scheduled to be torn down on Monday, and I promised Barney I wouldn’t be living in it when the bulldozer showed up. I’m looking for another place to stay with dirt cheap rates until I can afford something decent.”

“I’ll pay your rent. I’ll buy you a whole darn house,” Ron said, sloshing coffee over the lip of his mug onto the tabletop.

“I don’t want your money. I’m asking for information on available vacancies in town.”

“You could, uh”—he cleared his throat and concentrated on wiping up the spill—”stay here until you find another place. Your mother’s old bedroom is empty.”

She stared at him until he finally looked up. “What about the bathroom sharing problem?”

“I could probably handle one bottle of your girlie lotions sitting around—two, max. I’ll pound on the door and yell at you if you take too long, but I promise not to ground you. I learned my lesson with Angela.”

Veronica hadn’t thought she’d ever smile again, but a watery one found its way to her lips. “Can I call you Grandpa, too?”

Now Ron looked like he might cry. “You have a deal.”

…

Matt spent the next couple days working on various job sites, avoiding the office, and keeping himself too busy to think. He had no idea if Veronica was around or not, but he hadn’t seen her, so he figured the odds were not. Wednesday he spilled his water jug while replacing a broken window downtown, so he headed to the grocery store for a Gatorade.

The bench where the Hollisters sat was empty, stopping him in his tracks and making him scan up and down the sidewalk. The weather was beautiful, the kind of day they normally wouldn’t miss. He went in the store and picked out a bottle. While Becca rang up the total, he fished his debit card out of his pocket.

She held up the card and squinted at his name. “I’m going to need to see some ID with this.”

“I beg your pardon?” The Hollisters weren’t outside, and now the grocery store needed to see ID. He felt like he’d stepped into an alternate universe.

“Driver’s license or state ID.”

He hadn’t heard wrong. She just didn’t make any sense. “Becca, it’s Matt. I’ve known you since you were in diapers.”

“It’s store policy for anyone we don’t know or seems suspicious.”

“You think I’m suspicious?” Maybe she’d suffered a stroke. She was certainly acting suspicious.

“If you’re going to act belligerent, I can call the manager,” she said.

He’d known the manager since kindergarten, but he humored her and pulled out his license. Obviously, she was having a bad day. He’d have to ask around and see if anyone else had received the same rude treatment. She swiped his card, and he took the Gatorade to his truck. As he opened the door, he noticed the Hollisters standing in front of the Laundromat shooting the breeze. He’d run over and see if they knew what was up with Becca.

They stopped talking as he approached, which was a little strange. They’d always been perfectly congenial and forthcoming before. Maybe he was getting paranoid. “Hey, the bench by the store was empty. I was worried about you two.”

“We’re fine,” Wilbur assured him. “We have stuff to do now. We can’t lounge all day.”

“Ah, the community needs thing. Veronica not only convinced you to give her the space, she also put you to work.” He wasn’t surprised. It took every ounce of his control not to blindly follow her with his mouth hanging open. “How’s it going? I can help with some shelving or rods to hang clothes and give you a chance to sit and rest.”

“Kortville Construction put all that in already.”

Matt blinked. His company? In the past three years, there wasn’t a single job that he hadn’t overseen. If he wasn’t doing the work, he was assigning it to one of his employees. And he hadn’t done a thing in the Laundromat. “I’ll pop my head in and take a look.”

“Now’s not a good time,” Agatha said.

“No, definitely not.” Wilbur shifted so he was squarely in front of the door.

Something was up. Matt looked through the building’s large glass windows. The door to the back room was open, and he could see Veronica leaning against the frame. She appeared to be talking to someone else in the room. She smiled and laughed, her face as bright and animated as ever. He envied and resented her at the same time. He’d barely been able to function since their argument Saturday morning, and she was
laughing
.

“Who’s in there with her?” Matt demanded.

The couple exchanged a look that could only mean it was a man. Matt reached around the mayor and pulled open the door. He ignored their shouts as he strode through the row of washers and dryers.

Veronica turned toward the ruckus. Emotions ranging from hope to unbearable sadness flitted across her features before she held up a hand to her elderly saviors chasing him down. “It’s okay, you guys. I can handle him.” She switched her gaze to Matt. He must have imagined the emotions because now she simply looked resolved. “What are you doing here?”

“I thought I’d check on my company’s progress on the community center.”

“Come in and look around,” she said, as if he was a friendly acquaintance she had no history with. “You’ll be happy to know Ron stepped up to take on his share of the business load.”

So she’d gone to Ron instead of him. That stung. He might have rejected the big city job she’d tried to push on him, but he’d have donated the labor for this project if she or anyone else had asked.